ABSTRACT
The 1960s and 1970s represented a time of profound innovation and renewal for Ireland in its cultural and economic life. This was immediately followed in the 1980s by a recession which, while reversing much of the economic progress, had little obvious effect on social and cultural change. The dramatic nature of these changes and controversies in Irish society of necessity has affected the educational system. Apart from language and general culture, the most obvious and ineradicable difference between the two countries was religion. Immediately independence had been achieved the Irish government placing the revival of the Irish language at the top of its priorities, as the most powerful symbol of its new independence. The role which education plays and has played in Ireland in promoting or suppressing movements for change is obviously dependent in many ways on the attitude of the Catholic church.
